Heartstone
by Beautiful Thief
Summary: Being a girl is hard. Being a girl in love is hard. Being a girl in love with another girl is harder. For Aomine, being a girl in love with Kise is the worst.


I'd already been working on this before AoKise week - but I finished this for Day 7 of aokiseweek - AUs

* * *

Aomine is flat-chested.

Sometimes she likes it. It's certainly good with basketball, she'll admit, since she knows some of the other girls complain that running makes everything bounce too much to be comfortable. Sometimes she doesn't, like when she accidentally compares her looks with another girl and thinks that no boys are going to look at the muscular, tall, flat-chested girl with short hair who can beat them at basketball when they can look at some of those tiny, delicate girls who actually _have_ boobs and long, flowy hair and who are probably more comfortable cheering for them from the sidelines than playing against them on the court.

Aomine tries to make it a point not to compare herself with other girls, but it's hard not to sometimes. Even when you spend your whole life playing basketball in the local park, you still manage to pick up that message behind all the images that are everywhere as you walk home – the message where the girl you want to be is slim and sexy with a decent rack, and someone you can't be without help, if you can be her at all.

Aomine tries not to think too much about all the ways in which she's not really what any boy would really want, but sometimes it's hard because she feels like she's missing out on something when it seems like all the other girls in her class have gone out on a date with a boy and the ones who have boyfriends talk about love and how wonderful it is to have someone who likes you the same way you like them.

Still, she thinks, she's pretty happy just playing basketball, and if none of those pathetic boys in the boys' basketball club can appreciate her beyond her skill with a basketball, Aomine tries to tell herself that it doesn't matter anyway.

This works relatively well until the day a basketball goes flying past her and hits the head of arguably the prettiest girl in the entire school. Certainly, Aomine thinks she is – after all, Kise is a model. Aomine's seen pictures of her on billboards. She's the _ideal_ – or she's close enough to it, closer than she should be for a girl as tall as she is. She has beautiful long, golden hair, a devastatingly pretty face and she's slim with a hint of muscle tone to her. And she's got more going on in the boob area than Aomine does, though she's not what anyone would call _stacked_.

Aomine apologises for the fact that Kise got hit, while pettily telling herself she doesn't need to be envious of Kise's beauty, because Kise is probably too delicate to play sports, and returns to the gym, only to look at the door after she plays against a few of the boys in the gym and notices that there's a head of blonde hair there and it's watching her.

Aomine burns with envy when she discovers that Kise is a talented sportswoman in her own right, and can play basketball well enough after only a few weeks to play in first string. Kise, it appears, was _born_ to play sports – Kuroko tells Aomine one night as they walk home that Kise has played all the common sports and plays them perfectly and without parallel; and Aomine knows Kuroko never jokes, and she's seen the way Kise sees and copies and perfects and knows that Kise could be the best at any sport - and Aomine is so relieved to discover that Kise's grades are just as bad as hers because she doesn't think she'd be able to take it if Kise was literally perfect in every single way.

And then, somewhere along the line, Aomine is watching Kise play basketball and comes to the awkward and terrifying realisation that she might have feelings for her.

Aomine comes to this realisation as she watches Kise repeat and perfect one of the moves that was just used against her by a boy who arrogantly challenged her. Aomine has just kind of been accepted as one of the boys – her short hair, flat chest and loose clothes give her enough of the illusion – but Kise, who pleaded to join her as she played with them, was simply too girly with her long blonde hair tied back with a pretty blue ribbon and her form-fitting singlet, for them to accept her as a worthy challenger. Aomine had simply sat back on the sidelines, because Kise had to earn this the way Aomine had earned it. And perhaps, secretly, she was going to enjoy watching the moment the boy realised this pretty girl was going to trash him soundly.

Aomine's realisation hits fully as she finds herself smirking after Kise's resoundingly beaten the boy, and he's looking at Kise the way that he looks at Aomine – it's a heady feeling, to see them look at pretty, delicate-seeming Kise as if she's some kind of monster.

Kise doesn't seem to notice the way that the boy has changed the way he gazes at her; she turns to look at Aomine, as if the boy is beneath her notice. (He is, Aomine thinks. Everyone is beneath Kise's notice. Kise is a goddess in human form.)

"What did you think, Aominecchi?" she asks, with a smile across her face. "I'm getting good, right? I'll definitely beat you one day!"

"He's not even on the boys' first string," is Aomine's lazy response. "I can beat their first string."

Kise pouts, and Aomine's gaze is suddenly drawn there, and she has never wanted to kiss someone so badly, because Kise has never looked at Aomine like she's a monster; and in a moment of rare and sudden clarity, Aomine realises that all Kise wants in this moment is to be looked at like a monster the way that Aomine is.

Before she can follow onto the impulse to kiss Kise right then and there, Aomine grabs herself a basketball and throws herself into a game.

* * *

Aomine cannot hide her newfound revelation from Momoi for very long.

"Kise-san is very pretty, isn't she?"

Aomine resists the urge to punch him, and instead glowers at him. Momoi gently pats her shoulder, as if in sympathy.

"How long have you known?" Aomine whines.

Momoi looks thoughtful. "That you like Kise-san, or that you're gay?" he asks. Aomine stares.

"I'm not gay!" she shouts.

* * *

She's a little bit gay.

Okay, so she's never really paid all that much attention to boys, not _really_, if she thinks about it. Only in that it's kind of what she's expected to do, so she did, sort of. Aomine thinks she could appreciate a well-muscled boy, maybe one who's taller than her and could give her a run for her money at basketball, but she really thinks she appreciates Kise more than she could ever appreciate any boy because Kise manages to have a gorgeous figure while also having muscles and muscle definition, and how is that even fair? Kise also has a beautiful face and really shiny hair, and Kise can also beat boys at basketball.

Kise's entire existence is really just unfair.

Kise seems oblivious to Aomine romantically. Aomine isn't surprised, mostly because she figures someone as perfect as Kise will have some kind of picture perfect life. She'll go to a good high school despite the fact that her grades are almost as abysmal as Aomine's, and she'll get a hot model boyfriend and they'll date through high school and get married right after like some kind of fairy tale and her hot model boyfriend will be really smart and get a good job and provide for Kise her whole life and they'll have unfairly gorgeous babies. Being in a relationship with another girl is hardly something that Aomine can imagine for Kise's life plan.

Additionally, Aomine suddenly feels _self-conscious_ about herself. She's never really felt it before, not to this degree, because it doesn't matter what you look like when you can trash anyone at basketball and hold your own in a fistfight here and there when a sore loser decides to throw a punch. But Kise is a model, and she's so fucking gorgeous and graceful and somehow now Aomine feels like a clumsy hulk whenever she steps off the basketball court. Aomine is painfully aware that her short hair is always messy because there's no way to make it sit nicely when it's this short, and her skin colour is unusual, but Aomine feels like it only makes her uglier rather than making her look striking or eye-catching, because the dainty girls with their smooth pale skin look like porcelain dolls.

Even if Kise liked girls, why would Kise like _Aomine_?

The unfairness of it all would make Aomine want to cry, if she was that kind of girl.

"You should really just confess," Momoi tells her one afternoon as Aomine sulks while they walk home.

"No," Aomine mutters. "She'll just laugh at me."

* * *

Sometimes, Aomine wishes she could get away from Kise.

Even when they're not hanging out together, Aomine sees images of her around, and it gives off the impression that Kise is always there. She's started to notice photoshopping here and there on Kise's pictures. They make Kise's waist skinnier and her chest and hips larger on any full-body shots, and sometimes Aomine wants to ask Kise if it makes her insecure, the way that they try to make her look. They are not perfecting her, Aomine thinks, because she's seen Kise up close and she's already fucking perfect – all they're doing is making her less _real_.

She never does ask, because sometimes she feels like she's the only one who holds herself up against Kise for comparison. Kuroko's probably the steadiest, most secure chick Aomine's ever met, and Murasakibara is just... _Murasakibara_, tall with curves Aomine's frankly really fucking jealous of _and_ the longest legs Aomine's ever seen, but she's fucking _oblivious_; Akashi seems just infallible enough to slide through life without getting fucked up by the image of what society wants a girl to be (and she's a perfect dainty little porcelain doll girl anyway), and Midorima clearly doesn't give a shit about the fact that she is really fucking weird.

Aomine hates it, because all that's supposed to matter is basketball, and she's still better than Kise at it, but she can't help the way she looks at herself and wonders if she could ever make herself look delicate like Kise does when she dresses herself _just so_, so that you can't tell that underneath the clothes are powerful muscles, and does her make up so that you see only what she wants you to see, and not that she looks at people and understands how they tick.

She hates the way that Kise has gotten underneath her skin, and she almost feels like counting down the days until they move to high school, and then she'll probably never see Kise again except at basketball tournaments, and then maybe she'll stop being so fucking fixated on her. And then she thinks about life without seeing Kise every day and without playing basketball with Kise every day and every fibre in her being is simply repulsed by the idea of not seeing her pretty smile, of not hearing her talk about how she had to turn down another confession, of not getting to watch her play basketball like a goddess, and not spying on her PE sessions from her classroom – it's just a coincidence that Aomine's classroom overlooks the oval, but it's a _very_ nice one – just to watch her be obnoxiously good at everything they ever do in that class, and get picked first for every team.

She's not even sure she wants to be like Kise, at the end of the day; Aomine just kind of wishes that she could compare to Kise. Kise will always be prettier, more popular, and unashamedly, undeniably _talented_, and Aomine feels like there's really only one part of these in which she comes close to measuring up to Kise, to feeling _deserving_ Kise's attention and affection.

She hates the way Kise makes her feel.

Except that she doesn't because sometimes the way Kise looks at her makes her feel on top of the fucking world; it's almost better than winning at basketball. Kise looks at her like she's the one worth admiring, and it's a heady feeling.

* * *

Of course, soon after everything has to go to shit in Aomine's life because basketball slowly becomes terribly, horribly boring because there's not a girl out there, nor really, can she find any boy either, who can come close to rivalling her. It's like the pulling of that one thread unravels her entire life – well, her entire life has always been basketball anyway, so it shouldn't have been that surprising. Even loving Kise takes a horrible, painful turn for the worse, as she watches Kise love and shine in the sport she inspired her to play, and yet Kise, for all her abundant talent, cannot come close to matching her.

It's hard, because Kise loses her shine when her love of basketball, something they'd shared, is now something Aomine can't help but resent her for. She wonders how she could ever have mistaken Kise for a goddess, when Kise can't even touch her level.

"I'll beat you next year, Aominecchi," Kise promises at graduation. Aomine has never wished she was a boy as badly as she does today, but she's seen the number of boys who've offered Kise buttons and she can't help but wonder why on earth Kise would be any more interested in her if she was a man.

"You can try," Aomine answers. "You won't, though."

As she walks away, Aomine swears that next year, she will definitely not be in love with Kise.

* * *

It's unfortunate that Kise picked her new school because of its flexible attitude towards her modelling. Somehow, despite them both being in different prefectures, Kise feels as present as ever in Aomine's life. Momoi collects her photobooks and the magazines she appears in, and Aomine doesn't ever dare ask if he's ever thought of Kise the way that she does. She's afraid to know the answer. Momoi is handsome and intelligent, and would probably give Kise kids that were literally perfect; gorgeous, athletic, genius children with heads of strawberry blonde hair.

Then she feels stupid for thinking about Kise and Momoi getting together because she's not supposed to be thinking about Kise like that anymore, and it certainly isn't suppose to be _bothering_ her to think about Kise with other people. And the idea of the two of them bringing literal perfect beings into the world is kind of terrifying.

Aomine's days pass in an endless, boring haze, and she's the star of their basketball team, of course, though she never goes to practice and sometimes she's late to games. It doesn't matter – her condition for accepting the scouting was that she was allowed to not practice and still play in games, which was accepted so long as she still got the team the win; and of course, Aomine's presence also meant Momoi, who was just as much of an asset in his way as Aomine was.

The first ex-teammate she plays against is Kuroko. She has a new light, but while she has spark, she's not really worth Aomine's time, much like everyone else, but especially not in her current, injured condition. Aomine burns Kuroko's team to the ground and doesn't look back.

The next match worth being prepared for is the one against Kise. She's on time for the first time all season. She wants to wreck Kise today; she wants to show her exactly how foolish Kise is to believe she can win, she wants to show herself that she's moved beyond her stupid feelings about Kise.

But when Kise finally, finally looks at her, bored expression on her face and moves _just like her_, Aomine's shocked beyond words. She feels, instinctively, that Kise no longer looks at her like she's shiny and admirable, and it pisses her off.

She's miserable as well as pissed off when she steps off the court with the win, leaving Kise struggling to walk behind her, her lovely blonde hair matted and dripping with sweat.

* * *

Aomine doesn't play another game worth remembering until she faces off against Kuroko and Kagami again, and at the end of it she feels like she's been punched in the face.

When Kuroko calls her about her shooting soon after, and Kuroko works on her new shot after Aomine identifies the problem, they stop for a break and Kuroko only says one thing and refuses to engage on the topic further.

"Kise-san won't wait for you forever, Aomine-san."

Aomine's never asked Kise to wait for anything, and she tells Kuroko so, but Kuroko just gives her the 'you're really fucking stupid if you don't understand what I mean' look. Aomine's kind of surprised she can still understand Kuroko's blank faces.

Aomine watches all Kise's games; they're nothing really special, nothing that Kise has to break out Aomine's basketball form for. Aomine's kind of disappointed – she wants to watch Kise instil fear into everyone as she flows like Aomine across the court – until Kise's team faces off against someone Aomine had been fairly sure they would never see again.

Haizaki's still an enormous bitch, and Aomine wishes that it wasn't her who drove Kise to showing her hand, because the cow just wasn't worth Kise's best. But Aomine can't deny that she was wrong to have ever convinced herself that Kise was not a goddess as she moves like _all_ of Teiko's prodigies, not just Aomine; how she could have ever convinced herself that Kise would not catch up? Because Aomine's first instinct was correct, and Kise _was_ a goddess with that ball in her hand, burning bright and fierce, raging like an unstoppable forest fire.

Aomine's not sure if she can beat Kise anymore, and it excites her up until the moment she realises that if Kise can beat her, then there is literally nothing left that she can offer to Kise anymore.

Well, she'd wanted to practice anyway. This was just another incentive to get her ass in gear.

* * *

Aomine is out on a run when she quite literally bumps into Kise again after the Winter Cup. Her luck dictates that she knocks Kise flat on her ass.

To be fair, Aomine had been listening to her music, and not paying even half as much attention to her path as she should as she ran through the park. Kise had come from Aomine's blind spot behind a tree, and, well...

"Shit, Kise!"

Aomine pulled the headphones off her head, and offered a hand for Kise to help her up. Kise makes an odd face as she let herself be pulled to her feet.

"Sorry, I didn't see you," Aomine said. "I was running."

"Clearly," Kise answered, rubbing her back. "Ah, I'm all wet now..."

Kise was dressed up nice, in stockings, boots, a cute dress and a light jacket, now that Aomine looked. Ah, now she felt even worse. "Ah, do you want to come to my place and let your things dry? Do you have time? You look like you have somewhere you're meant to be..."

Kise shook her head. "Just finished a shoot," she said. "I was just taking a shortcut through the park to the station. You wouldn't mind? It's really cold, now that I'm wet..."

"Nah, it's my fault. Come on, I was on the end of my circuit anyway." Aomine settled her headphones around her neck.

"I'm not allowed to train for another week or two," Kise told her, quietly. "Doctor's orders."

"Ah, I guess no one on one, then," Aomine said absently.

"I wouldn't think you'd want to," Kise replied. Aomine cringed, but really, she couldn't blame Kise for reaching the conclusion she had. Silence hung awkwardly between them as Aomine struggled to put together a sentence that didn't make her sound like an insufferable asshole but also didn't sound horrifically embarrassing.

Middle grounds are _hard_, Aomine tells herself, so it's okay that they're not really saying anything, and then they reach her house.

"No one's home," Aomine tells Kise. "My room's this way."

Kise follows, and stands awkwardly in the door of Aomine's room. With good reason – Aomine's room looks like a tornado went through it; basketball magazines, clothes and shoes are haphazardly flung or kicked everywhere. Her schoolbag is sitting under her desk, which is covered in un-finished homework papers and textbooks that look like they've never been touched.

"Aominecchi, your room is so gross." Aomine looks over – Kise's nose is wrinkled.

"Shut up, I'll clean it soon," she answers. "It's just starting to reach the unbearable point."

"I think it's well past unbearable, Aominecchi."

Aomine throws a clean t-shirt and track pants at Kise. "Here. I'd offer you underwear but that would be way too awkward."

Kise's cheeks flush pink. "That's okay," she answers hastily. "Um, bathroom?"

"Down the hall to the left."

Kise nods and leaves. Aomine busies herself kicking her clothes into piles – clean, wearable, and needs washing – and collecting her shoes. It only makes her room look marginally less like a bomb went off inside it, but it's the best she can do for now, and she's sure prissy princess Kise won't want to hang out in her gross room anyway.

Aomine waits patiently on her bed, re-reading a basketball magazine and feeling sticky with the sweat of her run for Kise to return. There's something she hadn't quite taken into account when offering Kise clothes, however – Aomine is incredibly flat-chested and buys boy's clothes, and while Kise is not on the big side, she _is_ bigger than Aomine, and the t-shirt, which is loose on Aomine, hugs Kise tighter around the chest. This is awkwardly the first thing that Aomine notices as Kise re-enters the room.

Aomine's pretty sure she's never getting over Kise. That's pretty depressing.

"Um..." Kise sounds uncharacteristically shy. "Where should I put my clothes to dry?"

Aomine jumps up off the bed, glad for the distraction. "Here, let me take them," she said. "Um, if you're cold just in the t-shirt feel free to take one of my hoodies or something..."

If Momoi was there, Aomine's pretty sure he'd say she was fleeing, but since he's _not_, she's _not_ fleeing. She hangs Kise's clothes over some chairs and situates them near the heater before returning to her room.

She is not prepared for the sight of Kise in her uniform jacket and flicking through her wardrobe of clothes she doesn't wear. Kise looks _good_ in red and black, almost unfairly so.

Of course, blue suits her well too, but there's something so very sexy about Kise in red and black.

Aomine feels her face burning as she stares. Kise looks at her and grins.

"I didn't know you even _owned_ dresses, Aominecchi," she says, sounding delighted. "Will you wear one for me?"

"I'm all sweaty," Aomine mumbles. It is not a no, and Kise pounces on the opening.

"Please, please _please_, I bet you look so _pretty_," she begs. "You can go shower now, and you can show me how cute you look as payment for knocking me over!"

"I only wear dresses on special occasions," Aomine protests. "Knocking you on your ass isn't a special occasion. Besides, I don't even look any good in dresses."

"Lies," Kise promptly informs her. "Go shower, Aominecchi. Do you have makeup? Will you let me put make up on you?"

Aomine snarls her answer. "_No_."

But she does as Kise asks, because she _did_ run into Kise and knock her over and they're spending time together again and Kise is so hot Aomine thinks she's actually going to die, and she doesn't think she can refuse her anything when she's standing there in her clothes, but _especially_ in her jacket.

She takes her time, half because she's nervous (Aomine remembers the last time she wore a dress, she'd looked in the mirror and felt like an ox) and half because she might be primping a little (she hasn't shaved in a while, it's _winter_, but if Kise's going to put her in a dress then she doesn't want to be hairy, more because she hates the look herself than because she's worried about what Kise will think).

Returning to her room takes more bravery than she expects – her stomach is twisted in unfamiliar knots – but when she returns, Kise has laid out the dress she has decided she wants Aomine to wear.

"I bet you look super cute in this dress, Aominecchi," Kise says, grinning as she bounces her way out of the room. "Living room is this way, right?"

Aomine nods and Kise flutters in the direction of the living room, leaving Aomine to get dressed.

"If you call Momoi over, I'll kill you," Aomine shouts towards her before closing the door.

She feels awkward and uncomfortable as she puts on the dark blue dress, feeling bulky and enormous and flat in all the wrong places. She looks at herself in the mirror – this is as good as it's going to get, with the way the elastic in the midsection makes it look like she actually has a waist, and the way it fell just to her knees and hid her large, powerful thighs – and sighs before walking out.

The sensation of not wearing pants leaves Aomine feeling oddly exposed as she walks – there's no reason for her to feel that way, but she _does_. She pauses before she turns into the doorway to take a deep breath, and then enters.

Kise is hanging half off the arm of the couch, her hair brushing against the floor, but she sits abruptly upright as Aomine enters.

"You look so gorgeous, Aominecchi," she says, her voice a little breathy.

"Don't lie to me, Kise," Aomine says, shifting uncomfortably.

"No, you are," Kise insists, standing up and smiling as she walks over. "You're totally beautiful, Aominecchi, I promise."

"Can I get changed now?" This is getting way too hard for Aomine's heart. She can feel it thudding, hard and fast and painful in her chest as Kise speaks.

"Only if you promise that one day you'll wear a dress for me again," Kise says. She's crept into Aomine's personal space now, and their faces are uncomfortably close. Aomine's eyes flick down to Kise's lips from her pretty golden eyes, and then back up.

"I only wear dresses on special occasions," Aomine whispers. She's pretty sure her voice will come out strangled and pathetic if she speaks any louder.

"Okay," Kise agrees. "You can get changed."

* * *

Kise starts texting Aomine again after that day, and Aomine pathetically found herself looking forward to her inane messages and emojis. This is almost even worse than junior high, she thinks mournfully. She's nowhere near getting over her feelings for Kise. She actually thinks they might be _worse_.

Momoi keeps looking at her sympathetically too, so she feels like she's only five seconds from throwing a punch at him, especially when she scrambles for her phone every time it goes off – and then the way he smiles at her on the few occasions that it's not Kise makes her want to sink into the ground and disappear forever.

"I don't understand why you still haven't confessed," Momoi says to her, sitting on the staged area of the gymnasium as Aomine races around the three-point area throwing shots from anywhere and everywhere and racing back to the hoop after letting go just to dart back out with the ball.

"I told you before," Aomine says. "She'll just laugh at me."

"I don't think so," Momoi counters. "Ki-chan is hardly so cruel as to laugh at someone else's feelings. She received a number of love notes and confessions at Teiko, and she listened to every single one of them before gently turning them down." He paused. "Are you afraid of Ki-chan's rejection?"

Aomine pauses. "Well, yeah."

Momoi's smile is frustratingly sympathetic. "You talk big, but you're really very insecure sometimes, aren't you?"

Aomine chucks the basketball at the hoop moodily. "I talk big about basketball because I have the skill to back it up," she snaps. "I don't have anything to offer, you know. I'm not a particularly good or nice person, and I know it. I'm not particularly good looking either. What do I have to offer that Kise could like enough to be with me?"

She walks to fetch the thrown ball, and debates throwing it again. She decides against it, and puts it away. "I don't want to talk about this. Just let me be miserable in peace."

"If I was capable of doing that, I would have done it already," Momoi calls after her as she walks off to the changeroom.

* * *

It's the middle of summer just past the Inter High when Aomine finds herself running into Kise again while out shopping for new basketball shoes.

They hadn't managed to face off this year – they'd ended on opposing sides of the bracket, and while Aomine had made it to the finals, Kise had been knocked out by Akashi's team in her semis; to her unending frustration, if her text messages are anything to go by. Aomine's just walked out of the store when she spots her.

Kise usually finds it pretty hard to go around incognito just on the basis of her spectacularly pretty face, coupled with her height, which is contributed to by her fantastically long legs. She's wearing a wig today to hide the bright blonde hair which would be the final puzzle piece to the discovery of her identity. This tells Aomine exactly how badly she doesn't want to be spotted by people she doesn't know.

Aomine's frozen for a moment, looking at Kise, dressed in short shorts and a loose, airy shirt, summery and gorgeous, before she trots over to sling an arm around her shoulder, sparking a surprised yelp.

"If it isn't my favourite blonde," she says, grinning. "What's got you in my neck of the woods?"

"Aominecchi!" Kise's looking surprised, but not unhappy. "What are you..." she begins to ask, but a look at Aomine's bag tells her everything she needs to know. "Basketball shoes. You don't have enough already?"

"Nope," Aomine responds. "You didn't answer my question, Kise."

"Ah, I was going to look for some nice sundresses," Kise tells her. "I've gotten a little bigger since last year."

Aomine looks her up and down – now that she mentions it, there's more muscle to Kise than there was before, and she's taller too. Aomine hadn't noticed that she was taller, since she'd grown too.

"Put on too much more muscle and you won't be able to pull off your 'I'm a delicate flower' look, Kise," she teases. She goes habitually to tug on Kise's hair, then halfway into the motion, realises that could end badly.

"I didn't realise that was a look I was going for," Kise replies, smiling. "But if I was, I guess Aominecchi's just too cool to be taken in by such things."

Kise's teeth are white and straight, Aomine notices idly as she speaks. Then she realises that she's watching Kise's mouth and lips, and _damn it_.

"Do you want to come with me, Aominecchi?" Kise asks. Aomine's clearly missed something – Kise never shuts up, after all – but this gets through her thick head.

"Sure," Aomine says. "Got nothing better to do. Keeping pretty girls company is better than most anything else anyway."

Kise sparkles, and Aomine's pretty sure she's fallen into some kind of trap she hasn't noticed. This is confirmed when Kise steers her into a store, thrusts a dress in Aomine's bewildered hands and shoves her towards the change rooms.

"I was in here before," Kise tells her, "and I was thinking that you'd look so hot in this dress."

The dress is a cold sort of white, now that Aomine looks at it, but it's really nothing she'd ever usually find herself wearing. She tries to argue, but Kise's pushing her into the little cubicle to change.

"What do you even get out of this?" she yells at Kise, who better be fucking waiting outside and not looking for more dresses.

"I get to see Aominecchi in a dress," Kise says, sounding perfectly serene and content.

"Your sense of humour has gotten nastier," Aomine mutters, stripping out of her clothes. "It's not nice to laugh at people just because they don't look as good as you in everything."

"Were you speaking to me?" Kise calls.

"No."

She doesn't want to look at herself as she tugs the dress on, but she does to check it's at least sitting right. As expected, she looks and feels as if she's a boy wearing a dress – granted, she has slightly more going on in the hips department than most boys, but she's not... she's very... _ugh_.

She opens the door with probably more force than necessary, and scowls at Kise.

"What's with the face, Aominecchi?" Kise asks. "As I thought, you look so pretty!"

"No I don't," Aomine snaps. "Why do you keep saying that?"

Kise frowns, and looks at her, and then a dawning kind of steals over her features. "You really believe that, don't you?"

Aomine crosses her arms and looks away. "It's true," she says, her tone flat. "Can I get changed now?"

Kise shakes her head, the black hair of her wig flying around her. "No, you can't." Contrary to her orders, though, Kise pushes her gently back into the change room – but this time she comes in too, and she locks the door behind them.

"Aominecchi, how can you not see how beautiful you are?" Kise asks, grabbing her wrists and attempting to pry her hands from where they were buried beneath her crossed arms.

"I'm not though." She resolutely refused to let Kise pull her hands from where they were hidden. "I mean, I'm okay with that, I can play basketball and hold my own in a fight, that's a hell of a lot better than..."

"No, you _are_," Kise insists. "Seriously—"

Aomine shakes her head. "I don't expect you to get it," she says. "But can you please—"

"You're _wrong_." Kise has her stubborn face on. "You're wrong, you're wrong, you're _wrong_, I won't hear a word otherwise." She turns Aomine to face the mirror and stands up on her toes to hook her chin over Aomine's shoulder and look at her in the mirror too.

"You have," Kise starts, "_the_ most incredible legs. Look, all those nice, sleek muscle lines. It's totally hot. It's unfortunate that with our height, we don't really get away with wearing heels without towering over our dates, but I bet your legs are _incredible_ in heels."

Kise has wound her arms around Aomine's midsection despite her grumpy crossed arms. "You have, hands down, the _best_ abs," she continues, grinning kind of impishly. "Like seriously, it's so hot. And you have really nice skin too, and I know for a fact that you don't even use any products, do you know how unfair that is, Aominecchi? I have this ridiculously full on regimen to keep my skin looking the way it does and you just... don't do _anything_. Don't even try and lie to me, I've seen your bathroom. And you have such a nice, gentle face when you're not scowling at the world like it's personally insulted you, and your eyes are such a nice shade of blue, you know?"

Aomine couldn't help the heat sneaking into her cheeks as Kise kept speaking into her ear, feeling her body pressed up against her back, and the way her arms felt curled about her. This was bad. This was _really _bad. If she didn't do something soon, Aomine had a feeling she was going to do something _really stupid_.

"I don't agree," she muttered, looking at her feet. "Can I please get changed back into my clothes?"

Kise took on a pained expression, and sighed. Aomine could feel it in the way Kise's boobs, pressed against her back, heaved. Kise needed to let go of her right now.

"Fine," Kise said, kissing Aomine's cheek as she let go. "But I'm definitely right. You're super gorgeous, Aominecchi."

Thankfully, she left the change room before she noticed Aomine's stunned expression as she let her hands relax and one lifted to touch where Kise's lips had pressed against her cheek.

* * *

The next time she sees Kise, Kise finds her first.

Aomine's been spending most of her summer either playing basketball, napping, playing video games or pretending she does not, in fact, have a bunch of summer homework she's supposed to be doing – so essentially all the things she was doing while school was in, except now she doesn't have to get up in the morning to drag herself to school to sleep on the roof or slumped over her desk instead of in her bed, and when she's finally ready to be awake and maybe do something, she doesn't have to sit through any boring classes.

She'd made a habit of sleeping through most of the morning, and so it is that she's jerked awake at 10 in the morning – two hours before her intended waking time – by Momoi, who's unsuccessfully stifling a smile.

"You have a visitor," she's informed. Aomine goes to turn over and go back to sleep anyway.

"Get _up_," Momoi says, and pulls on her arm so hard Aomine topples out of her bed.

"Fuck you," Aomine hisses, pissed off and wide awake.

"Ki-chan wanted to talk to you," Momoi says, and before Aomine can get that through her brain and process it, Momoi leaves the room.

"Fuck you!" Aomine yells again at his retreating back, but she's getting up so she has to begrudgingly give him the win.

A quick bathroom visit to brush her teeth later, she stumbles into the kitchen, where she'd heard Momoi and Kise's voices. She glares at both of them as she enters. Kise, at least, is _acting_ mildly apologetic.

"I asked Momocchi if you'd be awake, I promise," she whimpers, "I promise I didn't know you'd still be asleep."

Momoi stands up – thankfully he has not attempted to make Aomine breakfast as an apology – and gives them both a cheerful smile.

"I'll let you guys talk," he says, and leaves. Aomine lets her head thunk against the fridge. Momoi is not being at all subtle.

Kise is fidgeting where she sits, and as she opens the door to the fridge to find some food, Aomine looks her over in the corner of her eye. She's wearing a simple white sundress today, and she looks like she belongs in some kind of story book.

"I'm _really_ sorry," Kise says. "I just. I have something I want to say?"

Aomine sighs, closes the fridge and leans back against it, looking at Kise head on. "What is it?"

Kise _blushes_.

It's really unusual to see Kise lose her composure. She's very socially graceful, though Aomine's never quite sure if it's because Kise has always been treated very well due to being gorgeous, or simply because she's been playing social games as long as Aomine's been playing basketball.

"I like you, Aominecchi," she says, head tipped down to look at her hands resting in her lap.

Aomine is quiet for a moment, and Kise rushes to add to her statement. "I mean, I _like_ you, like I have feelings for you kind of like you not like a friend. I mean I like you as a friend too! Just. Oh god."

"You know you're a model, right?" Aomine asks. She's leaning a bit more heavily against the door of the fridge than she was a moment ago, but she hopes Kise can't tell. Kise finally looks up, her cheeks still pink, but her expression is confused.

"You could have anyone," Aomine elaborates. "You're kind of perfect? Shit." Aomine runs a hand through her short hair and looks away.

She hears Kise stand, and take a few tentative steps towards her, and into Aomine's personal space.

"But Aominecchi is the best," Kise says, and Aomine can hear the smile in her voice. "So I don't want anyone else."

"Only in basketball," Aomine mumbled. "Not even sure about that anymore sometimes."

"Look at me," Kise demands. When Aomine doesn't move to look at her, Kise grabs her head and forcibly turns it.

"_I like you_," Kise whispers again before she rocks up onto her toes and kisses her.

Kise's lips are soft and gentle, and gone all too quickly. Aomine feels kind of dazed as she looks at Kise, feeling the warmth of Kise's hands on her cheeks.

"Seriously though," Aomine says, and Kise's pout emerges in full force.

"Shut up, Aominecchi," she replies in that fake-sweet voice.

"Make me," Aomine leers, and she quite effectively _does_. Kise's lips are back on hers, her fingers sliding through her short hair and the weight of her body pressing her back against the fridge and okay, yeah, Aomine can get behind this. She's not really sure what to do with... anything, she's never _done_ this before, not even with a boy.

Kise backs off a little, biting her bottom lip. "Are you okay? Is this okay? Is something wrong?"

Aomine feels her face get hot, and she looks away. "I..."

She looks at Kise from the corner of her eye, and watches her eyes go wide. "Aominecchi... that wasn't..."

Aomine is tongue-tied – can't find the words to admit that Kise is the first person to kiss her, the first person to have expressed an interest in _wanting_ to – and watches the understanding dawn on Kise's face, the way it softens, and she's not sure she can _take_ this, the way she's going to look at Aomine with pity...

But Kise just smiles and grabs at her arms, smoothing Aomine's hands on her hips and curls her arms around her neck. "I'm so lucky," she whispers, "getting to have Aominecchi's first kiss all to myself."

"You're so embarrassing," Aomine mutters. "Why do you have to say it like that?"

"Because it's true! I totally thought Aominecchi would have been thoughtlessly kissed some basketball idiot and had her precious first kiss stolen away!"

"No one else is stupid enough to want to kiss me," Aomine says, though it costs her a fair chunk of her pride to admit it out loud instead of just thinking it.

Kise pouts, and oh god, that is the worst. "I'm not stupid. Everyone else is stupid." But she smiles again then. "I guess I'll just have to teach Aominecchi," she says, and that grin is downright _cheeky_. "If Aominecchi's grades are any indication, I'll have to work hard."

"Oh shut up," Aomine grumbles, and yanks Kise closer again.


End file.
